I20 THE CONNECTICUT POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



delicious sugar cookies, of which I am very fond, and which 

 at the time my wife was very much puzzled to make. So she 

 asked our kind hostess how she made such splendid cookies, 

 and she told her formula. "Why," my wife says, "that is just 

 like my receipt, why cannot I make them like yours?" The 

 old lady hesitated a moment, and then holding- up her hands, 

 those lovely old wrinkled hands, said, "Belle, if you had those 

 two hands, you could make cookies as good as I." So I say 

 to those who fail in setting plants, "If you had my two hands, 

 which includes all that is behind them, there would be no trouble 

 making plants live." 



I aim to finish weeding the firs't week in September, as then 

 the young plants need to have their own way and not be dis- 

 turbed. I go over them carefully the last time, and if any 

 plants are uprooted, throw a little dirt on them and they go 

 on all right. This last weeding seems to do them the most 

 good of all, and when I get through I often think of what 

 our friend Hale says, "that weeds are a blessing." But, 

 mind you, it is after I get through, and my back stops aching, 

 because it isn't pleasant to think of my friends when my back 

 aches from being punished by pulling weeds. 



I never have put on any fertilizer in the fall, although it 

 may be well to do so. I mulch carefully with oat straw, and 

 am satisfied that it should be put on before the ground freezes. 

 I have always been led to think that I must wait until the 

 ground freezes before putting on the mulch, but that is a mistake, 

 emphatically. I have seen as much damage done in November 

 by freezing and thawing, as in March. The plants are, many 

 of them, weak in November and if the mulch is put on before 

 they freeze, it gives them a chance to grow strong, as putting 

 on the mulch stops the outside or top growth and keeps the 

 ground warm, which produces a bottom heat earlier, and thus 

 increases the root growth, and gives them a longer time than 

 they would have had if they were left uncovered, and the 

 gain at that time of the year will go a long ways toward a 

 better quality of fruit in the spring. I am so much in favor 

 of early mulching that I am cheerfully ready to do the extra 

 labor and stand the extra expense of putting on the mulch. 

 I never remove the mulch in the spring until forced to by 

 the plant growth, which is about May loth. Then I rake 



